If last week I was a gardener artfully pruning, this week I have been a surgeon delicately operating. The focus of my week has been on reworking, searching, massaging, considering, dreaming, and messaging text across the breadth of my Big Idea. The momentum of the “Finish Strong” message of last week propelled me forward into Module 6 material, but the nature of this week’s work required that I slow down, make a plan, wash my hands, get out my scalpel, and help the patient of my Big Idea find health. As I graduate from B-School, I have renewed energy. I have clarity born of engagement. I have the audacity to start before I am ready. I am seeking progress not perfection. Most importantly, I have a thirst to continue reading and learning and growing.

Week 6 Successes

Website Update

Progress continues. After a design contest was conducted on 99 designs. After a design was chosen. After a web developer was selected.  After a scope of work was nailed down. After design images were received by the development. Website development is off and running. Website copy is being edited, and edited, and edited. Within the next two weeks a revamped www.katiesteedly.com will be available.

A Marketing Love Story

A Fun Sheet this week asked about my attitude about marketing. That made me think. To date, my attitude about marketing can be summed up as willing, but not so ready and able. I spend a lot of time posting on social media, my blog, and on other sites – not ever really making any progress on traffic, subscribers, or conversion. I love the action steps this module offered for becoming master marketers. I know they will make the time I spend marketing much more useful. I love Marie’s marketing philosophy. Marketing does not have to mean hard selling. In fact. It probably should not. Marie’s marketing philosophy is about finding a voice, understanding what you are offering, and using your time effectively.

Social Proof

One of my favorite parts of this module was considering the social proof that exists for my writing, and by extension the Wide-Awakeness Project I am working to create. I have asked my web developer to include reviews on the new landing page that is being developed. Reading book reviews, blog comments, and other feedback I have received over the years felt wonderful. I am not sure why I have not connected with those votes of support earlier? Connecting with social proof is especially important at times when hope and strength and resolve can waiver in the face of doubt and fear and overwhelm. Sharing social proof will build relationships with my audience, and increase my platform from which to build by Big Idea.

Persuasive Writing Checklist

I used the persuasive writing checklist to write another draft of description of the founding concept of my Big Idea – wide-awakeness. “We are living in a time of asleepness. We are asleep to the needs of our neighbors, and we are all neighbors. We are asleep to the need for peace, and conflict is becoming our normal. We are asleep to love, as if love is something that must be measured, rationed, or guarded and freely given to just a few people that look a certain way, pray a certain way, speak a certain way, or love a certain way. Wide-awakeness is the opposite of all that. Wide-awakeness is abundance not scarcity. Wide-awakeness is faith not fear. Wide-awakeness is forgiveness when your heart has turned to stone. Wide-awakeness is breath when you have been gut punched. Wide-awakeness is love instead of hate.” I will keep working on this to make it come alive.

Sales Letter Checklist

Since we moved to Miami, I have been writing grants for non-profits. Throughout my career, sales letters have always been a part of what I have done – cover letters, proposals, and grants. This checklist makes the nuts and bolts of what needs to happen in a sales letter. The checklist, for both persuasive writing and sales letter, will be really helpful going forward. My next step is to use Dean Jackson’s Naked Truth Sales Letter Formula to work on my Templeton Foundation proposal.